Swamy links Karti name to telco deal

Janata Party President Subramanian Swamy shows a document during a press conference in New Delhi on Thursday

Janata Party chief Subramanian Swamy has dragged the name of Karti P. Chidambaram, son of the Union home minister, in the case of the Aircel-Maxis deal being probed by the CBI.

Swamy released a letter he had written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday along with a set of documents, which Swamy claims that they point to the involvement of Karti in the controversial Aircel-Maxis deal.

He alleged that there was a dubious transaction between a firm allegedly controlled by Karti through 94 per cent equity and Aircel Televenture Ltd, just before the controversial Aircel- Maxis deal was approved by the government in March 2006.

Attempts to contact Karti, including a questionnaire e-mailed to his office in Chennai, got no response as he is out of the country. But a source close to Karti denied Swamy's allegations, terming them to be completely untrue and baseless.

'We never had given any loan to Aircel Televentures or had any shares or equity in any telecom company, leave alone Aircel Televentures,' a source close to Karti said.

Swamy also alleged that Karti had links with another company that had transferred huge amount of money to its subsidiary in Singapore, but this allegation was also denied by Karti's camp.

In his letter to the Prime Minister, Swamy demanded that the PM should remove home minister P. Chidambaram from his post to allow a fair investigation into the Aircel-Maxis deal by the CBI.

'If this is not done, I will approach the court seeking a direction in this regard.I hope the Prime Minister does not repeat the same mistake which he did in the case of A. Raja and subsequently his office was pulled up by the Supreme Court,' Swamy said.

He alleged that it was not possible for CBI officers to probe the matter fairly given the home minister controlled the IPS cadre.

The Union home minister's office was contacted for a comment but there was no response on offer.